Good spot Platt, I shall look out for that ... "The thing that represents itself" ... the stange loop that is I ... the answer to the question posed.
Strange that I've not seen you own up to Hofstadter before - you've seemed to pooh-pooh any mention of recursive, cyclical causation. Ian On 2/21/07, Platt Holden <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Hi All, > > I see in this morning's news that Douglas Hofstadter, author of "Godel, > Escher, Bach" has a new book out whose title is the same as the subject of > this post. From the review I read, the new book pulls out the big themes > of GEB and develops them into a more focused picture of consciousness. Of > most interest to me, Hofstadter goes straight to the question I have posed > a number of times here, namely, "Who is the I that knows me?" Further, > Hofstadter confirms Pirsig's view that intellect (the highest form of > consciousness) is a symbol system with "the power to represent itself." > Finally, like me and others, Hofstadter attributes consciousness to lower > organisms such as flies, and suggests such "soulness" might be measured by > units he calls "hun-e-kers." > > So this is a book I'll add to my must read list. I'm sure others here will > do likewise. > > Best, > Platt > > moq_discuss mailing list > Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. > http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org > Archives: > http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ > http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/ > moq_discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
